Why Whistleblowing Protections Are Not Enough
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The launch of the CIISA standards marked a significant moment for the creative industries, signalling growing recognition of the need for stronger protections around bullying, harassment and misconduct across film, television and wider media environments.
But in a recent article for Broadcast Now, we highlight that whistleblowing protections alone will not solve the deeper cultural issues that have allowed harmful behaviour to persist for years.
Here is a taster of what our CEO and Co-Founder, Gemma McCall, discusses:
"It’s this silence that has created the whisper network, an informal system that many workers have trusted far more than formal reporting channels – whether that’s an informal DM warning a friend off a certain producer, or a WhatsApp thread that circulates information about abusers or toxic environments that people are scared to say out loud."
The article examines how a lack of trust in formal reporting systems has pushed many workers within the creative industries towards informal warning networks instead. In sectors shaped by freelance work, short-term contracts and power imbalances, many individuals still fear career repercussions for speaking up publicly.
Gemma also explores why the introduction of CIISA should be viewed as an opportunity for meaningful cultural reform rather than a purely procedural response to industry scrutiny.
"The industry needs to treat CIISA as an opportunity to create lasting cultural change, not just a compliance checklist."
Alongside discussing whistleblowing protections and accountability, we highlight the importance of trusted reporting pathways, psychological safety and visible action when concerns are raised. Without this, organisations risk reinforcing the same silence and mistrust that allowed harmful behaviour to become embedded in the first place.
Read our full article in Broadcast Now to explore what lasting cultural change could look like for the creative industries and why compliance alone will not be enough.
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What we're reading
Latest insights from the front lines of workplace culture.
The Junior-Senior Speak-Up Divide: What the Data Reveals About Hierarchy and Silence
Speaking up about workplace misconduct shouldn’t depend on where someone sits in the organisational chart. But as shown in The Culture Shifters Annual Report 26/27, it does. Junior employees are twice as likely as senior leaders to believe that speaking up is "pointless," with 54% holding this view compared to just 27% of senior leaders.
Why Collecting Misconduct Data Isn't Enough to Meet the New All Reasonable Steps Duty
Our co-founder and CEO, Gemma McCall, has written a piece for The HR Director exploring one of the most persistent gaps in workplace misconduct management: the space between collecting data and actually using it.
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The NDA Ban Under the Employment Rights Act: What It Means for HR
When you can no longer buy silence, you have to invest in safety. That's the shift HR teams now need to plan for. Some organisations have historically leaned on settlement agreements and non-disclosure agreements to resolve harassment complaints quietly, keeping the details contained and the reputational risk low. The Employment Rights Act 2025 closes that option down. Once the NDA ban comes into force, a culture of silence stops being something the law will let you enforce.
Feeling inspired?
Take the first step toward preventative misconduct management with a demo of our Report + Support™ platform. We can show you how to breakdown reporting barriers with anonymous 2-way messaging, and how to act before things escalate with name-matching and pattern-spotting across our analytics dashboard.
